My primary care, or family doctor, is an internal medicine guy but before that it was a pediatrician.

WSS

So if that's Primary Care Physician, sure.

@diehardbrownsfan said:

I'm guessing that GP is General Practitioner which is Primary Care Physician here.

Well I have heard the term GP my whole life. seems like primary care physician has mostly come about since HMOs.

WSS

@westside-steve said:

Another leech in the system. We didn't have the previously, but the last 10 years they've become a lot more prevalent.

Why then? Not sure. Money isn't *great* - though it's far from bad. Maybe the young doctors coming through get bored of treating little timmy's sniffles and great aunt doris' arthritis, and want to do something interesting. But, then, GPs do get cushy hours - 9-5, Mon-Fri, with usually a half day on Wednesdays.

*********************************************

They used to, a lot, but those are rationed to one day a week, every other week,

and there is only two leeches per hospital.,

@gftchris said:

Yes, but if it were because of socialised medicine, it would have always been like this - it wasn't. Maybe that plays a part, but I don't think we can say it's the only reason.

So how would you explain it? I don't know how many personal injury attorneys you have over there but we have a shit load. easier degree higher earnings potential and very little risk of killing a patient and almost no repercussion for fucking up a case.

WSS

@westside-steve said:

Yes, but if it were because of socialised medicine, it would have always been like this - it wasn't. Maybe that plays a part, but I don't think we can say it's the only reason.

@gftchris said:

health care over here has been socialised for somewhere around 100 years, so I don't think that's putting anybody off.

Yeah? Didn't you just say there weren't enough GPS and the wait time was really long?

@diehardbrownsfan said:

@westside-steve said:

health care over here has been socialised for somewhere around 100 years, so I don't think that's putting anybody off.

WSS

Bottom line, though, is that we don't have enough GPs - the old country GP is 50-60, and will retire in the next 20 years, and we're not training enough to take over. So waiting times go up for that, and people go to hospitals.

And another problem with our free shit is that so many people on Medicaid, who use the system for free, drag the kids to the emergency room for every bout of sneezing or diarrhea.

WSS

@gftchris said:

I'd imagine there's a pretty high number of them in the US, for various reasons*, but how many people get to use them? And how much do people pay in insurance costs because of it?

*Reasons:

The aforementioned business-ness of them, they have more money to spend on more things.

There are a large number of hospitals in the US!

There will most likely be a large 'western' bias because western hospitals tend to be better, though there are plenty in developed asia that will be in there.

Actually we can set up a two-tiered system where there would be facilities like the free clinic I mentioned and the top notch medical centers but you know how Americans are. The people getting the free shit (well more likely the politicians) would start bitching that they deserve what other people have to pay for then the community organizers are off to the races.

WSS

@westside-steve said:

I'd imagine there's a pretty high number of them in the US, for various reasons*, but how many people get to use them? And how much do people pay in insurance costs because of it?

*Reasons:

The aforementioned business-ness of them, they have more money to spend on more things.

There are a large number of hospitals in the US!

There will most likely be a large 'western' bias because western hospitals tend to be better, though there are plenty in developed asia that will be in there.

@gftchris said:

Your hospitals seem to be run basically as businesses, with massive costs for things. Which of course means insurance is needed, because nobody pays the massive costs. So then it becomes something of a racket between insurance companies and hospitals, and the prices just keep going up and up and up.

Here's where I lean left - healthcare is a basic service required by everybody that should be denied to nobody. Thus, it should be run by the state.

WSS

@the-cysko-kid said:

Feels like some of you are whining that I qualify for a subsidy and I'm taking it. I'd prefer to make 95000 a year and pay 12000 so I could still make 83000 a year if one of you fellas could go ahead and hook me up with a hundred grand a year job that'd be stellar.

You stated how affordable your healthcare is now. I wasn't whining because you qualify for a subsidy. I think it's great that your wife is able to be a stay at home Mom, and a subsidy helps you to afford your coverage. I just wanted to point out, that Obamacare really isn't all that affordable, for someone who doesn't qualify for a subsidy. That's my big gripe.